The prior art comprises different systems using Internet like a mean of transferring data, but it doesn't comprise systems capable of sending text messages from Internet and convert them into vocal messages on a telephone line.
By means of an IP connection it's possible to download songs, to telephone, to send e-mail messages, and to send SMS messages.
The most common peripheral unit, available for everyone, to be connected to Internet is the modem. This word is a mixture of two words, modulator and demodulator. The function of a modem is to convert digital data in the form of electric pulses into a form that can be used for the transmission on the normal telephone lines.
Therefore, the modem converts electric signals coming from the computer into sounds and permits their transmission by means of the telephone line. The receiving modem makes the opposite operation: as soon as it receives the sounds from the telephone line, it reconverts them into electric signals in order to make them available to the computer it is connected to. This further operation is called demodulation. Technical evolutions of modems are the new peripheral units and digital platforms that send data on a suitably shaped line without any need to convert them into sounds. We're talking about ISDN data transmitting cards. Another resource available to users is the DSL connection. Using this system it's possible to divide the vocal transmission from the data one, thanks to particular filters.
Also referring to Internet connections, the last available technology for users is the system of connection by satellites. Thanks to these systems nowadays even people who are not experts of hardware and software can surf on Internet, send e-mail messages, send SMS messages, send and receive fax and other relative operations. By means of data transmitting cards, permitting the transmission of complex data in audio and even video forms, also called technological platforms, many companies develop more and more complex programs and applications in order to provide firms with ancillary services.
One of the easiest ways to send communications with a telephone, using Internet, is writing SMS messages. For this purpose, the user fills in a form on the web writing a text and sends it to a server/gateway that transfers it to the mobile number the message is directed to.
However, this means of communication has some drawbacks. At first, SMS messages must be short and the communication reaches almost exclusively the users of the country where the portal works, in addition these SMS messages neither reach cordless phones not using the GSM system, nor common house telephones. What's more important is that the communication that reaches the final destination is mainly textual, in the form of a message that can be read on a display, not vocal. Another important characteristic is that users cannot verify immediately the result of the SMS message sent on-line.
On the contrary, the “text-to-speech” technology exists, which permits some interactions via internet/telephone. By these means, at present, an internet/telephone service where the TTS is in use, is the one allowing a service subscriber to receive the notification that a message has arrived on the phone, or to dial a telephone number and listen to the message in the form of speech. Nevertheless, this system is not convenient, as it needs registrations, it is limited and not easy to be used by an inexpert user. The TTS technology principally reads texts and makes them speeches, or vice versa, but it's extensive and however it doesn't allow to write and send a vocal message on a phone. As a matter of fact, the TTS technology has been useful for teaching, utility and support purposes, in particular for those disabled and blind, but as regards to its use with the telephone interactions, it's mostly based on “inbound” applications, i.e. centred in order to support inbound and not outbound communications. The vocal tree menus are an example of this and are used by companies in order to automatically provide the caller with information.
Other systems permitting to communicate by voice with another user by Internet also exist, but with the traditional methods, people holding a single telephone line cannot communicate by voice in a simple and comfortable way through the computer with another telephone. In fact, in order to make a call using Internet you need software, loudspeakers and microphones. In addition, also this one is a voice-to-voice communication, while at the present prior art an Internet user is not able to send text messages to the designated telephones, except for the messages appearing on the display of the phone.
The prior art does not include any system permitting to change a written communication into speech, reaching a normal telephone, by means of an IP connection.
This is the technical problem to be solved and the aim of the present invention.
The possibility to send long and wide text messages, later converted into vocal messages, to telephone numbers all around the world, permits to send easily and rapidly any kind of communication, no matter the length of the text. This operation can reduce costs and gives the sender a better guarantee than the previous systems, permitting a complete confirmation of the receipt by the addressee. Also the e-mails, the most widespread means of communication via web, cannot give guaranties about the correct receipt of the communication by the addressee. As a matter of fact, a simple automatic acknowledge transmission of the e-mail by the addressee to the sender is not sufficient to say he/she has entirely read the communication or understood its meaning. This acknowledge is much more complete using the system object of the present invention, which permits to check the complete or partial receipt of the communication, registering the opinions and interactions of the addressee. The present invention has also other advantages: for example, it allows people who have problems with communication, e.g. autistic, deaf and dumb, to communicate vocally on the phone with anyone without using their own voice, sending messages, help calls and other services by phone, so that the written text arrives to the addressee in the form of speech. Another application of this invention is to translate the text in any language by means of a simultaneous translator that changes the written text into the desired language and sends it to the addressee in the form of speech.